Robert Schumann

During the 1950s, 60s and 70s, Decca recorded a number of albums with some of its key conductors of Overtures. Many of these were singled out by the press for their terrific sound quality (the fabled ‘Decca Sound’) and for their often adventurous programming. Some of them also included entr’actes and intermezzi. Prized as collectors’ items, many of the original LPs exchange hands at high prices. And most of these reissues, in Decca Eloquence’s ‘Romantic Overtures’ series appear in CD, in part or whole, for the first time.

Romantic Overtures – Volume 3 features a conductor who recorded for Decca over a span of 36 years, from the 78 / early LP era (1949) to 1985: Karl Münchinger. Best known for his recordings from the Baroque and Classical eras, made mostly with ‘his’ Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, he also recorded with the Vienna Philharmonic and made just one recording – of Schumann’s Manfred and Gluck’s Alceste Overtures – with L’Orchestre de la Suisse Romande (in 1954). Appearing on CD for the first time, they round off a 2CD set that includes, also for the first time on CD, Münchinger’s recording of Beethoven Overtures, as well as a remarkable recording ‘Romantic Overtures’ of music by Weber, Schumann, Schubert, Cherubini and Mendelssohn. Also included is Schubert’s Zauberharfe overture which appeared on Münchinger’s famous disc of the incidental music for Rosamunde.

When it was announced that Leonard Bernstein was the become the new conductor of the New York Philharmonic in November 1957, Claudia Cassidy in the Chicago Daily Tribune wrote that it was “no great surprise” but injected a note of caution: “wish him luck, because no one needs it more than the musical director of a symphony orchestra.”

It turned out to be an inspired appointment. This set demonstrates what it was in about his music making and his personality that led the New York Philharmonic’s directors to choose him. It includes extensive recorded documentation of Bernstein’s career up to the time of his nomination in New York, mostly in live performances and rehearsal segments, working on music ranging from Mozart to Messiaen.

Bernstein’s work after his appointment to the NYP is represented in this set by performances of American music given as part of his “Survey of American Music” in the 1958–9 season (Fine, Harris and Piston), along with Copland in 1957 and Diamond in 1961; the 1959 recording sessions for two of his favourite twentieth-century classics (Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony and Copland’s Billy the Kid) which show conductor and orchestra at their most efficient and effective; and hitherto unpublished live performances of music by Bartók, Beethoven, Chávez, and Mahler.

Performing Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 (STEREO) RAI 1960, the concert was conducted by Torini Mario Rossi. Clara Haskill also performs Schumann’s Piano Concerto taken from her concert in Strasbourg 1955 (MONO). Conducted by Carl Schuricht.

The Violin Sonata No. 1 was written in 1851, at a time when Robert Schumann was – as expressed to his biographer Wasiliewsky – ‘very annoyed with certain people’, which may have been a reference to the tensions that existed between the composer and the Düsseldorf Musikverein. Schumann expressed his feelings of annoyance in the baroque-style finale through an air of robustness, even roughness, which sits in steep contrast with the fretful and tender opening movement. The public premiere was given by Ferdinand David and Clara Schumann in March 1852, but it was not until Joseph Joachim’s performance the following year that the work received the recognition it deserved.

Robert Schumann referred to the Violin Sonata as a ‘Duo’ with the two instrumentalists performing in equal partnership. In the Sonata by Johannes Brahms, on the other hand, the violin is always the principal voice, the piano never a competitor, but rather a subtle accompanist. Brahms wrote this work in memory of his godson, Felix Schumann, the youngest of Robert and Clara’s children, a gifted musician, who died tragically young of tuberculosis. He was only twenty-five. Clara Schumann was deeply moved by the piece, and particularly delighted by the finale with its quotation of ‘Regenlied’, one of her favourites among all of Brahms’s songs.

In her lifetime, Clara Schumann was best known as a great pianist, but up until her thirties she composed a fair amount of music, including a Piano Concerto, songs, and many piano pieces. Three Romances was the only work she wrote for the combination of piano and violin, and while the violin is allowed to sing out throughout, the subtlety and complexity of the piano part testify to its having been composed by a pianist of the first rank.

In 2002, at the age of twelve, Jennifer Pike notably became the youngest-ever winner of the BBC Young Musician of the Year competition. She has given performances throughout the UK and abroad and, now aged just twenty-three, is widely regarded as one of the finest violinists in Britain. Tom Poster is internationally recognised as a pianist of outstanding artistry and versatility, equally in demand as a soloist and as a chamber musician across an unusually extensive repertoire. The two performed together in the Concert for Violin, Piano, and String Quartet, featured on the recent disc of chamber works by Chausson with the Doric String Quartet (CHAN10754).

Roger Norrington was the first conductor to rediscover the original sound of the Romantic era. His recordings of famous overtures from Schubert to Wagner showed how fresh, indeed revolutionary an orchestra sounded in the early 19th century. Thanks to his careful studies of the instruments and performing practice of the time, Norrington brings out the poetry of the music in an unprecedented way, making his readings into true milestones of interpretation.

SIR JOHN ELIOT GARDINER CELEBRATES HIS 70th BIRTHDAY IN STYLE

30-CD box, in the packaging-style of the Messiaen Edition of 2008: tremendous value for this calibre of recorded material.

Original Jackets

The 108-page booklet includes an extended interview-article (2,500 words) with Jonathan Freeman-Attwood, Principal of the Royal Academy of Music in London, recording producer and trumpet-player.

The truly great DG / Archiv & Philips recordings from across his career, ranging from Monteverdi to Stravinsky via Handel, Bach, Mozart and Verdi.

Released to co-incide with his 70th birthday, several major performances, at least one TV appearance and the publication of his long-awaited book on Bach

One of the great advocates of period-instrument performance he has received more Gramophone awards than any other living artist … and now Sir John Eliot Gardiner is reaching the ripe old age of 70 without any signs of letting up on his almost frenetic life in music.

It’s an overwhelmingly vocal collection, a sequence of highly dramatic musical works that faithfully reflects Gardiner’s musical ideals and predilections. Sung texts and translations will be available as a digital download. The 30-CD box, in the packaging-style of the Messiaen Edition of 2008, presents the recordings in their original jackets, the 108-page booklet includes an extended interview-article with Jonathan Freeman-Attwood, Principal of the Royal Academy of Music in London, recording producer and trumpet-player. As ever with Gardiner, this provides a stimulating account of his life and music, and we plan to make the full interview, conducted earlier this year, available on the special website we are preparing for the occasion.

The birthday itself falls on 20 April 2013. Around it will be a marathon concert in London’s Royal Albert Hall, consisting of all the Bach Passions and Oratorios performed in a single day. Gardiner is also publishing a book on Bach, and there will be TV appearances as well (The Andrew Marr Show in the UK).

Although Otto Klemperer was approaching his 80s and not always in the best of health, the years 1967/68 were a period of great activity for him. The interpreter and creator who had been so at home with the radicalism of late 1920s-early 1930s Berlin picked up on the energy and youth of the age in 1960s London both to make and to work with new friends and colleagues.

With Pierre Boulez he attended and debated contemporary music concerts... . With Daniel Barenboim Klemperer debated Mahler 7, engaged in friendly banter about his own compositions and agreed ... to record with him the Beethoven Piano Concertos and Mozart No.25. He even did some work with Jacqueline du Pré on a test recording of Strauss’s Don Quixote. On his visit to Bayreuth he met Anja Silja and was charmed by her personality and the unsentimental nature of her performance as Elisabeth in Tannhäuser.

While Klemperer’s interest in cutting-edge contemporary music remained lively... his own performing and recording repertoire remained of an earlier vintage... . His Mahler now expanded to take in Symphonies Nos.7 and 9... . The Mozart operas and late symphonies that had once been so important to him... would now be performed, and recorded, in London as well... .

The London newspaper critics in October 1968 talked about this performance of Schumann Two as the rediscovery of a long lost work... . At first Peter Stadlen was perplexed: ‘it still comes as a surprise that Otto Klemperer’s tidily analytical mind will enter a happy symbiosis with Romantic music’. Mosco Carner (The Times) worried about Schumann’s mental health at the time of the score’s composition: because he was having ‘dark days’ (the composer’s own euphemism) surely the symphony couldn’t be good? ‘With Schumann’s difficulty in thinking in strict symphonic terms and his often clunky management of orchestral mechanics, the work would seem to merit its neglect’. Yet, eventually, Carner’s heart won out over his head. ‘Genius must out.

For all its faults each of its four movements contains moments of the sheerest beauty and the Adagio is a pure gem – typical Schumann in its introspection and Versponnenheit (‘airiness’) and demonstrating the puzzling fact of being like most of his slow movements, most imaginatively scored’.